Focusing Tiny Sunbeams
by Helljump
Summary: A good month before Harry gets back from Hogwarts, Dudley is bored, and stuck for things to do. His friends are still in their term, and boxing practice can only take up so many hours in a day... So when he finds an opportunity to pick up some big money, he wastes no times landing himself in a game of time travel, psychic powers, and a possible death with an unmarked grave.
1. Sunny Skies

Prologue - Or The one where Dudley starts picking up pieces of an adventure.

* * *

><p>Once, in the county of Surrey, in the town of Little Whinging, there was a family named the Dursleys.<p>

Their son, a strapping lad by the name of Dudley, who attended a well respected school known as Smeltings, had recently overcome one of the great demons of the current day, obesity, and in doing so, had discovered a great joy in the sport of Boxing. In this field he had achieved remarkable renown on a local scale.

He had a great many friends, of whom he was the leading figure. Amongst his peers he was undoubtedly the 'Alpha Male'. Such positions come with titles, and he was known as 'Big D' due to his stature.

His parents, very normal middle class types, were in appearance, nearly polar opposites, but in their hearts they were forever loyal, soulmates, if one subscribed to such things.

Finally, there is Dudley's cousin, a reclusive young man called Harry Potter, an orphan, provided for by his aunt and uncle. He was known to attend a boarding school for disreputable types. St. Brutus' a school in Scotland for incurable criminals.

Beyond this much, not a lot is really known about Dudley's cousin.

At the moment though, he's unimportant, as he is still at this school, assumably learning things useful to unreformed criminals.

As Dudley meandered away from Richmond park towards home, he wondered when life had become so utterly boring.

Between training for boxing and aimless meandering with the old gang from primary school, most of whom were still reaching the end of their school term, he found he was actually lacking things to do for the vast majority of the day.

He was so bored, he was actually LOOKING FORWARD to the return of his cousin for the summer.

He stopped. Shook his head briefly, and considered what his parents would say to that. Nothing good, he decided, and kept walking.

He was almost at the top of Magnolia Crescent when he heard it. The unnatural silence that he hadn't noticed until it was disturbed by ringing of a payphone on the corner. Later, when he looked back, he occasionally regretted the descision, but his gut was pulling for it.

The Dursley Gut Instinct, his father told him once, leads to a full Dursley Gut.

Ambling over to the payphone, he looked left and right before picking it up. "Hullo? Anybody there?"

"Hullo? Anybody there?" His own voice returned to him. His head pulled back, and he stared at the handset like it was a live snake. "Oi, what's going on?" "Oi, what's going on?" "Okay, you're freaking me out now, what the hell is this?" As his voice just echoed back once again, he heard a weird sounding chuckle from above him, he jerked his head out of the phone box to see a bizzare figure crouched on top of the booth... In a massive fur-lined dressing gown... Wearing a white and red mask?

He blinked, and it was gone. and nothing was there to even evidence it ever had been. The sun was blazing down through clear skies, and there were birds singing once again. Dudley fell on his rear, staring at the sky.

"I'm not going crazy... the heat's just gotten to me slightly." He decided firmly, ignoring that it wasn't truly that hot. He moved back to the handset of the phone, only to hear the dialtone buzzing away. Eyeing it askance, he took in the machine one last time, and took a card he saw hanging out of the pre-paid card slot.

"Psy-ren... Must be a foreign network or something." He mused before shrugging. "Oh well, if some gypsy wants to lose their time on the phone, their loss." He made his way home, pocketing the card.

* * *

><p>"So what did you do today, Duddykins?" Dudley's mother asked, simpering as she served up dinner. "Get up to lots of fun with all your friends?"<p>

Dudley contemplated spearing a forkful of chips to delay having to answer as he thought back to his uneventful day. After a seconds hesitation, he gave in to the temptation and stuffed his mouth with food (his mother made the biggest shudder when she saw the amount of food in his mouth), while grabbing the remote for the TV and turning up the volume slightly. He was about to switch the channel when he saw his the phone card in his pocket appear on the screen. Luckily the subtitles were on, otherwise he would have drowned it out entirely with his choking.

"In other news, the strange 'Psyren' movement has made the news after world famous fortune teller Elmore Tenjuin offered a reward of five hundred million yen, or two and a half million in British Pounds, to the man or woman to find out what exactly this phenomenon is about, and to tell the world. An additional smaller reward of five million yen has been offered for the 'Psyren cards' that are associated with the mystery. Our foreign correspondent, Takahashi Makoto is on the grounds of the Elmore mansion to tell us more, Over to you Taka!"

Eyes watering, Dudley swallowed his mouthful of food and waved off his father from slapping his back any more. "I'm fine!" He gasped. "Just get me a coke or something."

He turned his eyes to the screen on the other side of the table. Two and a half... Million. He'd heard something about a smaller reward, but his dad had once taken him hunting (before those Labour party sycophants had it banned), and told him that a good hunter waits for the prize worthy of his time. Ignore the small game, and go for biggest trophy possible.

A brief subtitle mentioning disappearances affirmed his newly made decision not to bring up the card with his parents. He was a Dursley, it'd take more than some ridiculous rumours of missing people to ward him away from the big money!

His decision made, he sat back and started paying attention to what his parents were yelling about...

"The lad's FINE Petunia! He doesn't need to be taken down to the Hospital for a little bit of food gone the wrong way!"

"But VERNON! He NEVER chokes on his food! What if something's WRONG! MY POOR LITTLE BABY!"

"Mum..." Oh brother...

* * *

><p>It turned out that he was in fact fine, though his mother put her foot down and made him go to bed early.<p>

And so, early to bed, early to rise, Dudley was up just before the crack of dawn. After a good half hour of giving the punching bag his father had acquired a thorough beating, he showered, downed a quick fry-up, and wandered out to the the phone at Magnolia Crescent, the Card in his pocket.

"... How do you use these things?" He mused, peering at the instructions on the side of the booth... that had been sprayed over.

He vaguely remembered doing that when he was ten. Wow. So this was what karma felt like. Whatever.

He grabbed the the card and jammed it into the slot, before picking up the handset and waiting.

"Greetings! Your world is now Con-nec-ted! You've reached the immigration offices of Psyren. We will now commence the immigration examination." Whatever Dudley was expecting, a pre-recorded babe giving him an exam... wasn't it. When a couple of little kids started pointing at him, he realised his jaw was hanging.

"...If your answer is no, press two. Question one: Are you a Japanese over twelve?" Dudley's brow furrowed. What the hell kind of question was that to ask?

"Get out of here you damn punk kids!" The kids started as they realised just WHO they were messing with, and scrambled off. Dudley swept his hand through his hair, and turned back to the phone. "Japanese over twelve? No..." Two.

"Question Two: Are you worried about the future of your world?" Not really. The world can take care of itself. Dad says that's what the Army's for at any rate. Two.

"Question Three: Have you ever suffered a head injury or been diagnosed with a serious illness?" He was always told he was healthy by mum... Two.

"Question Four: Do you have chronic difficulty breathing or have you ever felt your planet's atmosphere is difficult to breathe in?"

No. Two.

"Question Five: Have you ever dreamed of talking sheep?" No. That sounds like something Harry might do. Weird. Two.

"Question Six: Do you believe there is life in outer space?" ...That made him pause. Dad always scoffed at that sort of thing... but there were strange things out there. He knew that much. Rubbing his arse nervously, he pressed one, and carried on.

"Question Seven: You can walk without any outside assistance." Well duh, one.

"Question Twelve: Even if you couldn't communicate verbally, you could get your thoughts across." Sudden images shot into his head of a mouth filled with tongue, being unable to breathe, unable to talk, pinned down by his own gigantic... He shuddered. That was a memory best relegated to his nightmares... but He couldn't help but press two.

"Question Sixteen: You believe you could survive without eating for more than two days?" He gave serious thought to that one. He'd seen his cousin go without lunch for days on end before. It couldn't be that hard? One...

"Question Twenty Four: You have close friends?" He knew he could count on Piers when the chips came down. One.

"Question Thirty Three: You can overcome fear of the unkown through strength of will?" He'd overcome his fear with the strength of his fists... Damn that sounded cool in his head. He was using that line some day. One.

"Question Forty four: You spend extended periods of time away from home." He blinked. Yeah, he spent a lot of time at Smeltings, it was a boarding school after all. One.

Question Forty Seven: "You worry about your extended family." Aunt Marge flitted through his mind briefly before his thoughts settled on to Harry again. Not really... there was that massive scar in his arm after his second year... But that was probably normal for his sort, and he has a murder convict for a godfather. Criminal godfathers were meant to be amazing. Brows crumpled again, he pressed two.

Question Fifty Nine: "Your father is a high ranking director in a local manufacturing firm." Dudley, unnerved by the personal direction of the questions, more so in the last few questions put the phone on top of the machine for a second, and started pacing around the booth.

"COME ON TUBBY! YOU'RE ALMOST THERE! JUST A FEW MORE QUESTIONS!"

Dudley turned like a cat who'd just noticed a fat mouse, snatched up the handset and yelled "Who the hell do you think you are, you bitch!? I'm a Dursley! The only person who gets to comment on my weight is Harry! And he gets beaten for it!"

The woman, who he'd THOUGHT was a recorded message, replied with venom. "I bet your no good cousin would have finished by now! What's the answer? Yes or No?"

His hand itched. He so desperately WANTED to put the receiver... But instead, gingerly, he reached out, and pressed one.

"Good man! Question Sixty! You can weasel anything you want out of your mother by whimpering and calling her 'mummy'."

He didn't need to check, but he found himself looking at the window of the phonebox anyway. He was turning red. "You leave my mum out of this!" He didn't shout. He hissed. And found that as he spoke, his finger pressed one.

"Question Sixty One: No matter how much you wonder on the matter, you can't work out how your mother managed to squeeze out something your size when you were born."

The phone creaked in his grip as he slowly pressed one.

"Question Sixty Two: Your family baffles you when you try to work out how they can favour you so highly above your cousin, just because he has magic. You beat him when you were children, to try and get them to pity him enough to care, to be bad enough to be disciplined. You used this card to see if you could finally step over the line that you can't seem to find that will actually cause them to be angry with you."

Ice. Ice ran down his spine that ALMOST extinguished the fury that burnt within his gut. "How do you know that? How can you possibly know that? What are you? A bloody Shrink?!"

The creature on the other end of the phone line sounded like a predator, he decided. A spider, a snake, or maybe a cat. "Keep playing my game... and you might find out. Press the button, tubby."

One.

"Question Sixty three!" She shouldn't sound so happy to say that, he decided firmly "Would you like to go to Psyren?"

It sounded like a final question. Rage struggled against fear as he reached out, then paused... "Are you there?" He asked, "Are you hiding in this Psyren place?"

"Does it matter if I am, fat boy? Just tell me, yes or no."

"... I am going to find you. And I am going to knock out your teeth. Girl or not." He pressed one.

"Examination complete!" The voice chirped, suddenly sounding like a recording again. "We will contact you regarding the results."

The line went dead, and Dudley hung up the phone, prying his fingers off of it's frame. Grabbing the phone card that had re-appeared in the slot, he ambled away. "How're you going to do that you dumb broad?" He muttered "I rang you from a bloody payphone."

* * *

><p>-End Chapter<p>

Quick notes to those who're interested.

First off, it's wholy my intention that this story be friendly to those who are unfamiliar with Harry Potter and Psyren. If you're confused at any point, leave a review, and I'll try and resolve the issue either in a later chapter or in an eventual rewrite.

Secondly, lame as it sounds, this is my first serious attempt at writing fiction in a good five or so years, that's the only excuse I'm giving, and it's the only time I'll give it. If you see anything that shows the rust too badly, leave a review, and I'll make moves to fix it.

Thirdly, if you enjoy this fic, both now and later, important plot point: The entirety of HP canon, for plot reasons, has been shifted forward about ten years, meaning Harry was born in... 1989, I believe? But more importantly, he started Hogwarts in 2000.  
>I'll be attempting to account for this wherever necessary in the story. But, I'm not a history buff. If you think I've missed something important while writing a scene, leave a review, and I'll see what I can do. Bear in mind, Plot reigns supreme, and if I need something to have happened in a certain way, when history says it happened in another... well, there's a reason we call this fiction, eh?<p>

Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoy, as I've got more on the way.  
>Helljump<p> 


	2. A Bit Too Murky

Chapter 2 - The one where shows Dudley off his linguistic skills, and dissolves into a gibbering wreck

* * *

><p>After that phone call, Dudley spent much of the rest of the day alternating between trying to decide what the face on the other end of the line looked like, and projecting that face mentally onto his punching bag. She was a brunette, he decided. Young, and despite everything they showed in Disney movies, the women with the sharpest tongues were usually pretty ones. So, despite his anger, he found himself punching a face he might actually try to woo under any other circumstance.<p>

Now that he was calmer, and had had a night's sleep, he began to realise how bad that might sound to anybody else. It was probably a good thing that he didn't talk to himself much.

...

The next saturday saw him lounging on a parkbench, surrounded by his mates who were either laying on the grass or hanging off of their bikes in that weird ragdoll fashion that Dudley doubted he'd ever manage to pull off. Surrounded by his mates, he remained mute as he fingered the card in his pocket and slowly pondered what exactly was meant to happen next with this 'Psyren' thing.

Luckily, the lads had a tendency to fill any silence with their own mindless gossip. He wouldn't say it to them, ever, but his gang of friends often reminded him of his mum, ever with the latest dirty rumour of who at school had probably shagged who. Out of all his friends, only Piers seemed to notice that he hadn't really said much that saturday afternoon.

"Hey, Big-D, you managed to find a babe at your posh place?"

Piers was a great mate, really, but at this point he could have strangled the twig thin twit. "Piers... I go to an all-mens boarding school. I am not banging any hole in that place."

Piers grinned sheepishly, and slunk slowly away from the center of the cluster of teenagers "Oi, if Smeltings is such a great place, then why hasn't it got any babes?"

Dudley sighed, he was going to have to smack the bag some more later, he was sure of it. "Smeltings is, first off, CLASSY. I learn Latin and crap like that, that means that when I'm not at school, I can pretend to be smart, and pick a woman up like" Click of the fingers. "That. And if brains don't work, I've got brawn, I mean, have you seen my biceps?"

Jim, one of the guys sprawled over his bike like a ridiculous kite, piped up "Oh yeah, go on then, give us some latin then, Classy D."

With a furrowed brow, Dudley slowly dug up something from one lesson towards the end of his year. "Omnia mutantur nos et mutamur in illis..."

"Meaning...?"

"Your mother's so fat she has her own postcode."

"OI!"

"Kidding! Geeze! It means that things change and we change too. Like _I_ ain't so fat I have my own postcode anymore. Eh?" Dudley smirked and punched Jim in the arm. "Idiot, when I say something, I mean it, yeah?" He paused briefly and turned. "And isn't somebody going to answer that phone?"

"Err... What phone, Dudley? I can't hear anything?"

Dudley frowned, and got up. "Can't you hear that phone ringing? Seriously? It's starting to get annoying now. If you're going to have a mobile, you pick it up when somebody calls..." People were staring at him like he was weird. "Whatever, I'm going to go and find it."

"Who even takes a phone to the park anyway?"

Dudley took his own phone, a high-tech piece his dad had gotten hold of somehow, and waved it over his shoulder with a grin as he walked away. "This guy does." He opened it with a flick of his wrist as he walked round the corner. "Hello phone, this is Classy D."

Nobody heard his parting line though, as the moment he put the phone to his ear with a mocking lilt, he disappeared.

* * *

><p>"Hey, Dudley! Where'd you go?" Piers ran from one corner of the park to another, looking for his absent friend. "Dudley? DUDLEY?!" Eventually, he gave up and wandered towards the nearest payphone, to ring number 4 and see if he'd gone home.<p>

* * *

><p>"This is Classy D... Where the hell am I?"<p>

When Dudley first saw the dusty ruins, he didn't know what to think. Everywhere he looked, there was just more... debris. A half collapsed terrace over here... a completely collapsed convenience store over there... A lopsided street sign... A rusted set of swings...

Hold that thought! A street sign! Dudley sprinted (Which is a casual jog to most) to the face down sign, and with a heave, tipped it and its concrete base up and over.

Hyacinth Lane, with a little emblem on the end for the Little Whinging Town Council. Dudley's eyes widened.

"N... No way." He looked back and forth, trying to find another landmark... And that was when he saw the giant woodlouse.

"What the actual..." Dudley swore as he slowly backed away from the insect that was just slightly taller than he was, and moving forward towards him at a walking pace.

His eyes darted all over, his brain going into overdrive as he tried to comprehend an INSECT that was BIGGER than he was... in all three dimensions.

After a moment more of barely restrained panic, he lost it entirely, and screamed bloody murder as he ran away as fast as his legs could carry him. Looking around desperately as he ran, he saw the ruins of several more buildings, but more vitally, locked onto another landmark.

He recognised the shed outside that house.

Which meant he recognised that house. That house belonged to Tony, the smallest kid in his Primary school class, he'd been over there for birthday parties, and under that shed, Tony's dad had shown them all his underground larder. The entrance was way too small for The Giant Woodlouse.

Dudley changed direction immediately, and ran, gasping for breath, towards the shed.

An hour later, Dudley had finally calmed down enough to get his act together and plan.

He'd smashed through the rotten wood of the shed with ease, and been down the stairs into the cellar in seconds, before curling into a ball in the corner. "This isn't happening, this isn't happening, this isn't happening..."

A few minutes later, the sound of splintering wood and quiet chittering reached his ears. The clunking noise of broken planks never ceased. None of this broke him from his mantra.

But what had stopped was Dudley's babbling, was a booming voice in his head, that he remembered with crystal clarity: The Bitch.

THOSE SEEKING PSYREN SHALL TASTE POWER AND DESPAIR!

THOSE REACHING PSYREN SHALL BE GIVEN THE WORLD

THERE IS ONE EXIT IN THIS GAME

THOSE SEEKING PSYREN AND THOSE SEARCHING FOR THE EXIT TO THIS WORLD...

FIND THE GATE!

Suddenly, he could see only one thing, perfectly in focus, with crystal clarity in his mind:

The phone box that had started it all. Defaced by him all those years ago, standing proud and untouched by the destruction surrounding it.

Even the bloody glass windows.

At that point, Dudley didn't taste power or despair, but a faint glimmer of hope.

That phone box was his ticket out of here.

All he needed to do, was get rid of the car-sized Wood Louse. Simple.

Dudley curled back into a ball in the corner. "This isn't happening, this isn't..."

* * *

><p>End Chapter<p>

The beginning of this story is incredibly quick to dump Dudley in it, and as I stand currently, about to start on chapter five... I can't help but think I went in too quickly. On the other hand, as I mentioned at the end of the previous chapter, I do intend to eventually redo the start of this story. What I was needing to to when I was writing this part of the story, was just get the words out of my head and onto my sheet, buld momentum.

Fun little fact, this chapter was originally two incredibly short chapt-ettes. Each with their own little mini cliffhanger.  
>I was... uncomfortable with merging them. BUT, I was even more uncomfortable with having chapters that short. I'm not entirely convinced that I handled the merging that well... But that's something I'm intending to fix later. (not in the rewrite, but just as an edit at some you can pinpoint the EXACT point where I welded them, I'll give you a web-cookie.<p> 


	3. A Single Beam of Light

Chapter 3 - The one where Dudley shows a wood louse what's what.

It took Dudley another half hour to work up the courage to go to the stairs of the small cellar and actually look at the monster that was probably going to eat him the moment he stepped out of his shelter.

It was scurrying back and forth, trying every half minute or so to wedge its massive bulk into the stairwell, though luckily failing. It looked like it had been starched white by some unspeakable... Thing. He daren't think further on what could have created such an abomination.

After that he noticed the tough looking carapace, seeming for all the world like it could take a car to the side without too much issue... He didn't think he was going to take it down with fisticuffs... Despite his bravado to the woman on the phone.

His head snapped up.

Psyren. The bitches voice in his head had named it, and he still had the little card in his pocket. Gingerly, he picked it out, and stared at it. "I bet you knew about this, didn't you. Big white bug, everything ruined... You knew it was coming. Well, the joke's on you, I'm still going to find you, and I'm gonna to give you the beating you deserve, woman or not."

A scuffling sound above his head told him the louse was trying to get in again.

"Gonna get you too, stupid bug. Gonna crush you like I did all your buggy friends back home. Just gonna take a bit more effort is all..." He looked up, and went cross eyed as he realised that the creature was actually slowly getting in this time. "FU-" He swore repeatedly, looking for something, anything, to clobber it with. But the shelves were bare, and there wasn't anything handy to use as a weapon.

"Bugger it all." He pulled his fist back, and jabbed up with all his might at the only weak looking spot he could see. A small red orb on it's underside.

A second later, he was closing his eyes and covering his face as the entire thing exploded into dust, covering the entirety of the floor of the larder with what must have been a good foot of the stuff.

"What. The. Hell." He looked up, and saw no evidence that the creature had even been there... outside of the gouges it'd taken out of the wall getting down of course, but he found himself wondering for a brief second if he'd been imagining the freak creature.

Then he saw the cracked red orb in the dust, roughly the size of a baby's fist. He picked it up, and rolled it around in his palm, checking the fracture lines.

He smirked for just a moment, before letting that smirk grow into a chuckle, and then a full blown belly laugh. Serves it right for taking on a Dursley!

Dursley gut instinct, once again bagging a damn good prize. With one last coughed out snigger, Dudley pocketed his trophy, and stepped out into the open world.

Oh bugger. He hoped Tony's dad wasn't alive in this wasteland somewhere. His shed was firewood now.

He started walking, taking in the landscape properly this time, now that he wasn't being chased by a monster sky was a dull, ugly brown, that showed no sign of where exactly the sun was in the sky. Looking to his watch idly, he realised that he'd been in this strange reflection of Little Whinging for over two hours now. He wondered if anybody was worried, back home. If home even existed still? He paused. What happened when he left Psyren? Did he get sent back home? Would he appear back in the park, where he'd disappeared from in the first place?

He kicked a loose stone at the roof of a submerged house. Buried beneath vast quantities of soil and rock... He didn't want to know how that had happened. The entire terrace, buried like a lego set on a beach. He looked to his right and saw another set of houses tilted over like the leaning tower. He raised an eyebrow and backed away from that as well.

"First thing I'm doing when I get back" He decided "Is getting that tub of Ben & Jerries out of the freezer."

Wait, was he nearly there already? He spied a telephone box, and wandered closer. No. It wasn't. No graffiti.

"Damn it all, WHY DO ALL THE HOUSES IN THIS TOWN LOOK THE SAME?!"

* * *

><p>After another two hours, and countless checking of whatever road signs he could find, Dudley finally found the right telephone box.<p>

The problem was, there was another creature right next to it. A huge, ugly as sin, spider. It looked tougher, stronger, and probably faster than the wood louse. And he couldn't see any little red balls to hit on it.

Without a glowing weak point to hit, he wasn't anywhere near as confident that he was going to be able to get this thing. And he hadn't been confident with the last one.

...

Blow it, he was this close already, he might as well head down towards the house and see how it'd fared. The huge as hell spider could wait.

* * *

><p>Number 4 looked relatively intact, albeit a bit worn at the edges. And there would always be that feel about it that just called out "home" to him. Even if it was identical to every house in the flipping town.<p>

Without much hesitation, he tried the door, and on finding it locked, put in his key.

It fit, and he stepped in, reaching for the light switch.

Nothing happened.

"Huh, wonder if the bulb's broken..." He stopped, then slapped himself. "Of course there's no bloody power, what sort of idiot am I..." Groaning, he started towards the kitchen, forgetting any earlier caution. "There must be some tinned food or something in here..." After all, in a pinch he supposed you could technically eat baked beans raw.

With some rummaging, he found a can of ham and a tin opener. His stomach groaned loudly at the sight of food. God, he hadn't realised how hungry he was...

"You are a long way from the nearest settlement, scavenger." A low rasping voice spoke behind him.

He spun, and found himself face to face with the spider from earlier.

He screamed. Knives, forks, plates, and anything else Dudley could lay his hands on flew through the air at the giant spider as fast as he could lay his hands on them.

The spider did nothing but retreat under the barrage, letting the items bounce harmlessly off it's hide.

Dudley darted forward to the cupboard under the stairs, and reaching around the fold-out bed stored inside, grabbed his cricket bat.

Stepping out again, he eyed the shadows cautiously, and advanced upstairs towards his parents' room.

"I know you're in here somewhere..." He called. "This is my house... So you can just go away, yeah?"

The only thing that returned to him was a faint chittering. And it seemed to be coming from his cousin's room... so he slowly picked his way forward until he found his dad's chest of drawers, pulling out the bottom one, and picking out his grandad's service rifle.

Giving it a quick once over, checking the action as his dad had shown him during their one hunting trip, he quietly inserted ammunition, and edged back out the door.

Harry's door was open now, he steadfastly ignored the urge to go inside. He had a bad feeling about the contents of anything that might have played hometo a spider of that size.

"I'm armed now." He announced to the air. "If you try anything, I'll pepper you with lead faster than you can blink, you hear me?" If the spider had anything to say on the matter, it didn't share.

He left in silence, locking the door behind him, and noted that it was darker than it had been. He still couldn't see any sign of the sun though.

Eyes open wide, and keeping his ears open, he walked towards the mound of earth that had been (he approximated) where Wisteria walk and Magnolia crescent HAD been. Beyond that, lay the booth. And beyond that, he hoped, home.

When he crested the hillock, he found only disappointment. There were now two giant spiders there. TWO! He dropped to the ground, and fumbled with the rifle, raising it to line up a shot... He exhaled slowly, kept himself absolutely still, and pulled the trigger.

...

And nothing happened.

"BLASTED PIECE OF SCRAP!" He gave up. He hadn't come this far just to find himself stymied by a gun that didn't bloody work! Raising himself up again, he charged forward, brandishing the gun like a club. "GET OUT OF THE WAY! I'M GETTING TO THAT BOX!"

Half way there, however, he ran out of puff, and bent over, gasping.

The two spiders sat there, one on top of the phone booth, and one to the side, just staring at him.

Judging him.

"Shut up!" Gasp. "I used to be obese!" Gasp. "It's not my fault... The doctors at school said mum overfed me when I was a kid!" One more deep inhale, and Dudley righted himself, and locked stares with the one spider.

The one spider.

"We have been asked by the friend of Hagrid, not to eat humans. The friend of Hagrid defeated our worst enemy, and so we grant him this favour..." Behind him. "Please do not attack me again. Or we may forget that favour, and remember our hunger. We have not eaten in many days."

Dudley's eyes bulged. "O... OK" He didn't look backwards. He just kept staring at the first spider, and started plodding forwards. "I just want to get at the phonebox, OK? If I don't attack you, then that's cool, right?"

The spider said nothing, and Dudley just kept walking forwards, until he finally reached the remarkably unscathed structure.

He picked up the receiver, held it to his ear, and listened for a dialtone... getting nothing, he put it back on the hook.

"I don't get it... The voice said come here, find the gate and stuff... But nothing's happening."

The two spiders chittered for a couple of seconds, before the one on top of the phone box spoke in their rasping tones. "The one before you also came to the box. And disappeared. I know not how."

The two bugs were STARING at him. He hated it. But they said they weren't going to eat him, so he slung the rifle over his shoulder by its strap and started poking buttons. It didn't seem to be doing anything, but it distracted from the spiders staring at him, which was comforting.

The number buttons did nothing, and the instructions on the booth itself were still useless. He cursed his younger self again for being a no-good hoodlum.

Eventually, he turned and punched at the booth itself, crying out in frustration. "WHY CAN'T IT BE AS EASY AS GETTING INTO THIS MESS IN THE FIRST PLACE!?"

Then it hit him. And he felt like a tool. Again. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the card. And with tangible effort, resisted the urge to crush it in his hand.

Instead, he inserted it into the machine, and held the handset to his ear. "Hel-" And without any fanfare, he disappeared.

In his wake, two spiders chittered madly between each other.

End Chapter

* * *

><p>Hi, and thanks for reading.<p>

I'm publishing this slightly ahead of my self set schedule, I got a couple of positive reviews, went a bit giddy, and just decided 'why not?'

Thanks to both Dragon-vine and Opinr for said reviews.

It has been mentioned that we don't yet know exactly when this is yet in comparison to HP canon. I'm not saying anything yet, as it will become obvious further down the line... but there should be enough information hanging in between the lines that you can pin it down.

Hope you enjoyed, and continue to enjoy.


	4. A Misty Sunrise

Chapter 4 - The one where Petunia fails to call an ambulance

* * *

><p>"Hello?" Dudley stared across the street at the perfectly intact houses in front of him, and took in the sudden, jarring transition from scrapped wasteland to samey suburban perfection.<p>

He looked up, half expecting to see the looming shadow of his very brief 'companions' but instead saw nothing but the slightly clouded mid evening sky.

He'd never been so glad to see it.

* * *

><p>He was briefly accosted by a rather concerned sounding friend of his mothers, asking him where he'd been like it was her entitlement to know, before harrassing him about carrying model rifles in the street. Didn't he know that people had been SHOT over carrying the most obviously fake guns? His was a rather realistic copy, he could be targeted by missiles from a militiary base for all he knew.<p>

His mum's friend, he decided, had an incredibly overactive imagination.

"I'm fine, just out for a walk" "The model's part of a dramatic production at Smeltings, I'm just seeing if it's comfortable to wear over the back. Don't want the actors chafing themselves with a lumpy prop after all!" "Missiles... Mrs. Dunham, are you off your pills again?"

* * *

><p>He walked rather briskly away from his mother's friend, having had quite enough interrogation for the day. Rounding the corner to finally get into Privet Drive, he quickly got to the front door of his house, taking in it's unweathered face with a relieved sigh, and nipped into the door.<p>

"THE BOY'S PROBABLY FINE, PETUNIA! Most likely just went off for a bit of private time away from his friends. Strapping young fellows like my son need time for introspection, after all!"

"But Vernon! What if he's attacked! What if he gets viciously assaulted by wild animals! What if..."

What happened next, Dudley only saw briefly as he stuck his head round the corner into the living room. His dad had bent his mum over backwards, and was snogging...

Enough of that, Dudley decided. He wasn't going to pry any further, and what's more, he was going to try and forget he'd seen that. Giant spiders. Giant Talking Spiders. Giant Intelligent Friendly Talking Spiders... And a monster wood louse.

Much less disturbing.

He crept up the stairs, and slipped the rifle off of his back, under the bed. He'd compare it to the one in dad's chest of drawers in the morning... The cracked red orb went onto his desk, and he resolved to grab a bowl from downstairs so it didn't roll away, tomorrow morning... and having said that, it might not be dark yet, but he was tired. He slipped off his shoes, and let himself fall into bed.

He blacked out almost immediately.

* * *

><p>Dudley had never been one to dream, especially of talking animals, so when he found his slumber interrupted by spiders appearing from the ceiling and chasing him around town calling him 'Classy D', and a giant dragon fly asking him how to get to Tokyo, he thought it was fairly understandable that he freak the hell out, and wake up.<p>

Then, at four o'clock in the morning, he found that he couldn't breathe through his nose because it was dripping blood EVERYWHERE.

The Dursley house woke up early that Sunday.

* * *

><p>"Mum! I need more tissues!"<p>

"In a minute, poppet, I'm on the phone! Yes, that's number FOUR Privet drive. What do you mean the address doesn't exist on your computer? Of course it does! No! I don't mean Private Drive! It's Privet! V E T... It's next to number six and number two! OH! So Gladys at number two can get an ambulance for her tart of a daughter, but I can't get one for my son? Now you listen to me!"

Vernon shook his head and chuckled quietly as he sat next to his son, handing over a roll of kitchen towels. "If there's one thing I hate about those freakshows your cousin hangs around with, it's that somehow they made this house incredibly unfriendly with computers. Ever since he landed on our doorstep... I've gotten used to it with all the paperwork that my secretary throws at me. But your mother... hasn't had to worry about bureaucracy since she left work when she was pregnant. I've had to write down 'between two and six Privet Drive' so many times now, I forget what an absolute pain it would be for anybody else."

Dudley just snorted, and tore off another square of paper. "Hey dad, wouldn't it be simpler just to drive?"

"Would if I could, son, but the car's in for repairs. And heaven forbid we cause a fuss by asking Alan at number seven for a lift..." Vernon rolled his eyes. "Don't worry lad, it's just a nose bleed. It'll stop at some point." He leaned back and let Petunia's ranting on the phone wash over him.

Dudley sat awkwardly for a bit, scrunched up another square of paper to hold to his nose, and then asked one question that had been bugging him. "Can we get some breakfast already? I'm starving here dad."

Vernon actually burst out laughing at that. "That's my boy!" He roared.

"QUIET VERNON! I'm on the phone!"

The laughter died down considerably with Petunia's reprimand, but he chuckled a moment longer. "One second, how's the nose looking?" A bloody tissue flew in his direction. "Right... Probably best not to have you eating at the moment. If we actually get to the hospital, the doctors might want to run tests. And your granddad always moaned that he wasn't meant to eat before his doctor's visits... Could be the same here."

"But dad, I'm hungry..."

Another chuckle. Dudley thought his dad was taking far too much amusement in this. "Best to bear it, son." Vernon stood. "Come on, let's leave your mother to it. I'll brew you some tea. Who knows, you might stop bleeding in a bit, and then we can apologise to the people on the phone for inflicting your mother on them."

Dudley joined him, deciding that no matter how irritating it might be to have his father so uncharacteristically cheerful, it was preferable to listening to his mother screeching down the phone.

"NO! I'M NOT DISCUSSING THIS WITH YOU ANY LONGER! HAND ME OVER TO YOUR SUPERVISOR! HOW DARE YOU EVEN SUGGEST THAT MY SON IS DOING DRUGS!"

Much preferable.

* * *

><p>"Any luck, petal?"<p>

Dudley's mother collapsed into her chair in the kitchen and accepted the mug placed in front of her by her husband. "None at all, onion. That witch on the phone accused our Duddikins of drug abuse! Said that it was a possible symptom of 'inhalation of powders'. Then when I asked to be put through to her superior, the man accused me of wasting the time of the emergency services, and harassing his staff! He hung up on me Vernon!" She looked close to a breakdown, Dudley noted.

"Petal, don't worry too much about it. Our young man here's finally stopped bleeding..." His dad paused, deliberately acting out deep thought. "Say, you've given blood before, haven't you dearest? Do you remember what they do after a donation session?"

Dudley saw a wink sent his way, and played out his part of The little drama his dad had come up with. "Oh, I feel slightly lightheaded... It must be the lack of breakfast... And bacon. Ooh... Err... Ooh..." The look his mother sent him at that left him trailing off. "Err... I AM kind of hungry though. Seriously mum."

The raised eyebrow got turned on his father next, who didn't shrink under his wife's gaze. "Drink your tea, love. I'm being quite serious here, the boy lost a lot of blood this morning. And it's eight in the morning now. Easily late enough that we should be starting breakfast." Vernon rose from the table. "I'll put on some sausages... Maybe get a start on some eggy bread..."

Petunia put her head in her hands, moaning. "The neighbours probably heard all the ruckus we were making. Goodness knows what they thought of it all..."

"Petunia dear, do you want eggs?"

"No, thank you Vern... You're cooking." She sounded like she'd swallowed something distasteful.

"Yes, Petal, I am. Any preference do the number of sausages? Dudley? You'll be wanting two or three, right? Keep that champion physique of yours on form?" Once again, his dad sounded overly cheerful.

Dudley was about to answer when his mother cut in. "Vernon, You're doing that detestable variation of fried bread. Aren't you."

"And you can't stop me, my lovely. They're already soaking in that lovely egg juice." The mischief in his eyes could be HEARD. Dudley hadn't even known that was possible.

"Vernon. You know how I feel about that dish."

"You despise it, I love it. The boy loves it. Even HE likes it. If there's one thing I like about him, it's that he can make a proper fry-up without any sort of fuss... Would you like beans champ?"

Dudley flashed his dad a thumbs-up before hiding his head. He'd heard this argument too many times in the past to think it could be avoided.

The moment he'd finished eating, he was throwing on a shirt and running out of the door.

"Seeyoulaterdon'tkilleachotherovereggsbye!" SLAM.

He was going to head to the gym, he decided, and see if he couldn't improve his stamina. Yesterday's adventure into madness felt like a dream at this point, but his failed charge towards the payphone had been HUMILIATING.

The place was in the town centre. About three miles away...He could manage that in hour, surely? If he jogged some of it?

* * *

><p>An hour and ten minutes later, he was up the stairs and in the reception area, waving as he passed one of the instructors, Joe. "Hey, are the running machines free?"<p>

"No, they got taken by Higgs and Boson earlier. You're stuck with the weights kid."

Dudley made a sound of disgust. Higgs and Boson never seemed to be on anything BUT the treadmills.

Joe seemed to be of a mind with him on the matter. "They should stick to the running track, but first come first served. I'll see if I can't kick them off in half an hour or so. Kay?" He took in Dudley's less than pleased countenance. "What's up, kid?"

Dudley didn't think it was really a good idea to tell anybody about his hellish hallucination, but wanting to be able to run a hundred meters without get out of puff probably wasn't that unusual.

"Just wanted to work some on my stamina. Don't want to be getting out of breath when I'm running with the lads. I don't really think I've got the... Physique to be cycling, if you get me?"

"Yeah, I hear you kid. Look, give it a quarter hour, and I'll go point out that other people pay to use the facilities as well. In the mean time, If you could spot for Tina on the weights, I'd be grateful, fair?"

Tina? "Who's Tina?"

"She came in last sunday. New girl. Bit stubborn about the weights. You might like her."

Dudley nodded, and wandered through the door into the gym proper, looking for the usual build of a stereotypical muscle girl that frequented gyms.

Instead he saw a little thing that would make his cousin, Harry 'skin-and-bones' Potter, look like he was overweight. Blonde, pretty... and wrestling with a set of weights that was probably just slightly heavier than she was.

"You ain't doing that right." He told her bluntly. "You ain't lifting right, and you're trying to lift too much... I got enough people calling me a dumb blonde without you helping the stereotype along. Yeah?" 'Enough people' was one guy he met on a bus once, but that wasn't important.

"What would you know, chubby?"

* * *

><p>Five minutes later, the outlines of their 'challenge' were set out, and Dudley was flat on his back on the bench, and ready to receive the first pair of weights.<p>

"These are the five kilo ones, right?"

Dudley looked over to see her holding up a green disk with a little difficulty. "That's right. They go two, five, ten, twenty, from left to right on the rack. Like coins, yeah?"

"Gotcha" A couple of clunks later, he was set up with two five K weights on each end, and he slowly talked Tina through proper lifting.

"Bend your arms like so, and then back up... and we repeat a few times... and then you put a couple more weights on. Gotcha?"

If she'd been staring at his middle before, Dudley noted smugly, she was definitely keeping her eyes on his arms now.

They kept it up for a while, with her adding more weights every few lifts, and Dudley just focused himself on lifting correctly, and the bar in front of him.

A good quarter of an hour later, she mentioned that they'd ran out of fives.

"Just add a few of the others." He grunted, and kept pumping.

"Err... What's your name again?"

Here we go, he thought, with a hint of satisfaction. "Dudley Dursley, pleased to meet you...?" He trailed off, hinting.

"Huh? Oh, my name's Tina. But Dudley... your nose is bleeding." She sounded concerned.

He smirked, and opened his mouth... and then he realised what she'd said. "Oh, sh..." He dropped the bar into the rest, and got up off of the bench. "Not again! This is the second time today! Tissues!" He felt his world spinning briefly, and fell with a THUD to the floor. "Tina... after a session of lifting weights... you get up slowly."

Joe chose that opportune moment to stick his head in on them. "Dudley! I finally managed to give Higgs the boot, and I think Boson will be following him in a minute... Are you okay kid?"

Dudley just groaned from the floor. "Tripped, think my nose is bleeding. Tissues please."

* * *

><p>"Ey 'Choe." Dudley sat on the weight bench next to a concerned looking Tina. Holding a wad of tissues against his nose.<p>

"Yeah kid?"

"Ow 'uch 'eight ih o' bat bah aby-ay?"

Nobody seemed to understand quite what Dudley had said then, so he just sighed and pointed at the bar. "Ow buch 'eight?" The blank look from Joe just pissed him off, so he got up and started counting the discs himself.

"Ey, Iya! Bese are 'ens! Ot 'ives!"

"What?" Tina stared at him. "I don't understand..."

Dudley looked upwards in exasperation. "Bood Brief..." Experimentally, he took his hand away from his nose... and noticed it was still dribbling slightly. "These are tens, not fives. There's... over... two hundred kilos on this bar." He sat down heavily. "Bloody hell..." His eyes wandered to Joe. "It's a very good thing I wasn't trying to lift this bar. Hey, Tina? Because that would be physically impossible. Right Joe?"

Joe, who had been counting along with Dudley, nodded. "To be frank, I'm surprised the support hasn't broken under the weight by now, that's just over two sixty."

"What are you talking about Dudley? You made it look ea-"

Thankfully, another instructor dashed in as Tina was speaking, handing Joe a six pack of water bottles. "Here we are Joe! Water. If he's been bleeding this morning as well, he should be taking in fluids..."

"And what's more, Lucy, he shouldn't be here. Spontaneous bleeding twice in a day could be a symptom of something worse." He fixed Dudley with a stare, "I'll drive you home in a bit. Lucy, could you let the others know to keep him from doing anything too strenuous until we've had a doctor's note?"

The two instructors walked away, leaving Dudley and Tina on their own.

Tina stared at Dudley "Why did you say that you didn't lift them Dudley? You were like a machine back then. You didn't even slow down."

Dudley thought for a moment, and then started talking, slowly. "The human body has limits, Tina. And if you break them, then the body starts to break as well..." He wiped his upper lip clean of blood, and carried on. "I don't know what happened just then, I wasn't thinking about how heavy the weights were... And just concentrating on moving my body the right way." He gave her a sideways glance. "If you try and do things that are well over your limit, you can, and probably will injure yourself. Don't push too hard at this sort of thing, Tina. It's all about slow progression."

He got up, and started removing weights from the bar. "This bar weighs six kilograms by itself. I'm going to remove all the weights, and get you lifting properly. Then I'm going to add two kilos on each side. And if that's too much, you're going to stick with six for the rest of today. OK?"

Tina looked up at him as he took a swig from his water bottle. "Okay."

Dudley just smirked, and finished removing the weights. "Right, flat on your back."

End Chapter

* * *

><p>This is coming out somewhat later than I would have liked, I've hit a bit of a stumbling block with the next chapter where the flow just doesn't feel RIGHT. I'm not pleased with it at all really, but then I realised that it'd been over a month since I'd updated last, started feeling guilty...<p>

And here we are.

So yes, for those savvy in the Psyren canon, Dudley's going to be alone for the first little while in exploring his new capabilities.

Once again, thanks to those who reviewed, you're amazing, and give me mega positive vibes.

Hope everyone enjoyed this, and I'll try to hurry out the next chapter.


	5. Even Thick Mist Evaporates

Chapter 5 - The one where Dudley thinks, and Vernon becomes happier.

* * *

><p>Dudley lay on his bed that night, morose.<p>

Banned from the gym for a fortnight, they said; or until he went to get himself cleared by a doctor.

He'd almost pitched a fit at his parents, but he'd been hit by memories of the previous summer, where for the first time in his memory, they'd resisted his desires for the sake of his health.

Ironically, after all of the effort spent getting him into the gym, his mother was now steadfastly against it.

He groaned into his pillow. Stupid Joe. The moment he started speaking to mother, she seemed to revert to the mindset of his childhood, attempting to smother him with affection.

Not that he objected much to that, but he was a growing boy, damn it! He wasn't so delicate that he'd break from a little exercise... And it was embarrassing when Piers came over later that day.

He rolled off of his bed, dropping into a dozen push-ups before slumping again. He just wasn't feeling it.

Tina, the blonde from earlier, had turned out to be almost pleasant to hang around with, but was apparently only in the area for maybe a week and a half, she'd said.

Just his luck that he'd managed to forget to ask for a number. And with the gym ban...

It was going to be a very boring fortnight, he realised.

Then he glimpsed something under his bed.

* * *

><p>The next day saw Dudley doing a whole lot of not a lot. His dad had work, his mum was at her book club discussing some romance novel that she'd briefly attempted to make him read. (Pigs would fly first, he firmly asserted in his head) Piers and the gang were still at school for another week.<p>

After half an hour of jogging around the local park, he'd headed back home to the distraction he'd remembered yesterday.

Why didn't his grandad's rifle work? He knew that his dad had used it once, and what's more, had shown him how to shoot with it, but it hadn't worked in the mirror world. Or Bizzaro-land.

...Ruinville?

Reaching under his bed, he dismissed naming the place he'd been, and retrieved the rifle, giving it a proper check over by moving all the bits that he remembered were MEANT to move.

It took him less than five minutes to give up and go to his dad's drawers and check it against the original.

* * *

><p>"What sort of moron takes a weapon and makes it so it can't even shoot?" Dudley fumed as he stared at the twin rifles.<p>

The one from fake-Privet had had its inner workings, from what he could tell, completely mangled, if not removed or plugged up.

Basically, utterly useless. More like a paperweight than anything remotely threatening.

He replaced the original where he found it. And after a moment of deliberation, decided to hide the scrap metal under some broken toys in the cupboard under the stairs.

Nobody used it these days, after all.

* * *

><p>"How was your day, champ?"<p>

Dudley looked to his father from the TV. "Boring. Nobody's out of school yet, and there's nothing more interesting than-" He pulled a face, "-Antiques roadshow on the telly."

His dad's moustache twitched. "Oh? Anything stick out from the chaff?" The mercenary side of the Dursley mentality reared its ugly head, and Dudley saw a chance to drag his dad into something.

"A couple of old World War journals, a uniform, a rifle that looked like grandad's... When was the last time we dusted it off anyway?" As hints went, it was horribly heavy handed. But dad didn't look like he minded it that much, in fact, there was a sudden gleam to his father's eyes.

"Yes... It has been a while since we fired off a round or ten, hasn't it?"

His father had barely touched firearms since a rather strange time when he was eleven, Dudley recalled, a huge and terrifying man had briefly abducted his cousin, destroying his dad's own rifle in the process. The incident had been rather traumatising for them all in various ways.

None of the Dursleys particularly LIKED Harry, but the manner in which he'd been whisked away had opened up Dudley's eyes to a world completely alien to the ordinary existence that the Dursley clan had appeared to cling to.

It'd been a real pig's arse of a situation, all said.

But this sudden shine to Vernon Dursley's eyes... It was rather frightening how well it suited him.

"My boy," He said, "let's go on a little father-son outing tomorrow afternoon, eh?"

It was as if he were suddenly more alive, Dudley decided.

It was the oddest thing.

* * *

><p>In the end, they'd spent more time travelling around town looking for a reputable place to buy a weapon than in the coutryside, Dudley mused. Apparently gun control was growing tighter since the government had clamped down on fox hunting.<p>

Not that that would ever be enough to stop a Dursley on a mission, his father had murmured. They'd had to make two trips back to the house for various bits of paper that they'd needed. Though the elder Dursley had been happily surprised to learn that his previous licence covered him for what he was looking to get that day.

"Deer stalking" He'd said. "Old family tradition that I revived a while back. It's been over a decade, but I've been clay pigeon shooting since then." He'd quickly added to Dudley, "I'm confident enough that I should be able to hit centre mass on a pheasant for your mother to cook on Sunday." Knowing wink.

* * *

><p>As it turned out, despite extended effort neither of them so much as scratched a bird that evening.<p>

* * *

><p><strong>And I'm back! <strong>(Take 2 after brief connection failure when attempting to save)

So. That took way longer than it should have. Couldn't really approach the beginning of this chapter in a way that cooperated with my sense of writing. I barked orders at the cast, but apparently Classy D is a bit of a naff actor.

So I skipped any mention of the post-gym, avoided writing Joe, Tina, or Gym extras 1, 2, and 3, and avoided the tantrum that I wanted to write.

But this process took me about a year to actually drill through. Compounded by a general lack of energy from working nights. (Not fun, by any stretch.) Eventually, a friend of mine demanded more soonish after hearing a rough plot synopsis. Guys, please thank RuruLala for being a faithful friendly pest and poking me. She's amazing.

Sorry it's shorter than some. Hope you enjoyed. More to follow.


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